About

Accounts

You are at the newest post.Click here
to check if anything new just came in.

What I wanted to get off my chest for some time now:

All the stuff happening in the US political-wise (for the last one and a half years - give-or-take) keeps reminding me of this quote from Douglas Adam's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:

"The President is very much a figurehead - he wields no real power whatsoever.
He is apparently chosen by the government, but the qualities he is required
to display are not those of leadership but those of finely judged outrage. For
this reason the President is always a controversial choice, always an infuriating
but fascinating character. His job is not to wield power but to draw attention
away from it." [The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; Chapter 4]

Each and every tweet coming from Trump, all the shifting of personnell, mindless remarks about whatever, the soap-opera-way of governing the most influencial country on the planet, keeps the media busy with reporting on these, nevertheless outrageous/stupid incidents and the people's focus on the margins of political importance. Probably it has been like that, or similar, during Adam's days. However, I would argue reality has never been that extremely close to the satirical exaggeration I know from his books.

(oh yes, and not to forget this one:"The major problem—one of the major problems, for there are
several—one of the many major problems with governing people is that of
whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let
them do it to them.
To summarise: it is a well known fact that those people who most want
to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To
summarise the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made
President should on no account be allowed to do the job. To summarise
the summary of the summary: people are a problem.") [The Restaurant at the End of the Universe; Chapter 28]